First day at OOW

Just finished the first day at Oracle Open World.  Got in around noon local time (got up early for my flight from the east coast).  Went downtown to register and was greeted by the tent:

I don't drive in San Francisco everyday (never really) so I don't know how much of a hassle closing the street is - but it will make for a better conference (spent much time waiting for the lights before - now we don't have too...).

Anyway, after registering I was walking down the street.  A group was taking  a photo and upon seeing a lone person walking - asked me to take their picture.  I obliged.  I had to laugh when they saw my name tag - and knew me.  That was fun - they were pleased to have their photo taken by "me" (which is a bit strange, but fun).

After meeting with some people, I had a bit of time to kill - walked around China Town for a while:

All of the times I've been to San Francisco - never took the time to walk there - very nice/interesting.  Spent about an hour walking around until it was time for the Oracle ACE dinner, there I met up with Mark Rittman and Tim Hall (Oracle ace of the year he is!):

The Oracle ACE of the year is on the right, Mark Rittman on the left,  can you tell?

There were many "luminaries" there - including this pair (Bryn Llewellyn - owns PLSQL, Steven Feuerstein - known to know how to write PLSQL).  You should not draw any conclusions about the effects of lots of PLSQL coding and hair from this picture!  I am sure it is entirely coincidence...

Anyway - tomorrow kicks off with keynotes and then much work.  I'll check in sometime during the day to give a quick update...